Think You’re Fast? This ’69 Dart Will Knock Your Lights Out!

The sport of drag racing and the world of hot rodding are in a constant state of movement and flux. What’s cool today may not be in a couple of years. Whatever the flavor of the week in terms of trendy body styles will likely be sold for pennies on the dollar down the road, but there are exceptions. Since the dawn of hot rodding, having the baddest car on your street made you the man. From the dawn of drag racing having the baddest car at the strip made you the man. When those two things converge and you can own both ends of the scene you go straight to hero level. In eastern Virginia, Ron Bookman is that guy and the 1969 Dart you see here is the reason. An absolutely brutal street car that evolved from humble beginnings to become one of the baddest grudge machines in the region, this 1,400hp street-driven monster bends people’s minds, plucks money from their wallets, and puts smiles on faces every time he cruises it down the street.

Ron Bookman was a motivated high school athlete who was playing ball for one of the best high schools in the state when he happened to accompany his brother to a night at the local hot rodding spot—an illicit street racing jump off point—more than 30 years ago. It was a night that changed his life forever. Ron laughed and told us, “I still see my old football coach around town and he always says, ‘Bookman, you could have been somebody!’” Football quickly disappeared from his life and an all-out obsession with cars and speed took over. “The way the noise from the cars was bouncing off the trees, the smell of the rubber and burning fuel, it was the coolest thing I had ever seen before.” The Dart came into his life in 1981 and Ron left it as a leaf-spring car, racing it with a warmed up iron-headed 383. At that time it went 11s and was both a bracket racer and a street cruiser. In the early 1990s the track Ron was racing at closed and with it went his passion for the Dart. He put the car away and went hunting and doing all manner of other stuff until his passion for speed and horsepower was rekindled by one of the most popular and iconic movements the automotive aftermarket has ever known.

“Around 1995 I started seeing all of these big-tire pro street cars and I just loved them,” Ron said. “They looked so cool and tough and the fat tire look was the in-thing at that point, so I took the car out, had an S&W back-half kit installed, bought my first set of aluminum heads, and had a Pro Street car that ran 10.20s and looked awesome.”

The car was very well known locally and actually appeared on the popular show PassTime where Ron ran 9.70s and had a very positive experience. “That was a nine-second car through the mufflers and on ET Streets,” Ron said. “Everything I have ever had or raced has been through the mufflers on a DOT-legal tire.” 2009 brought about an avalanche of changes that began with one simple request. “I asked my wife if I could build a motor exactly the way I wanted it, kind of go all-in,” Ron explained. “She said ‘yes’ and I was immediately looking at ProCharger setups, calling around to different engine builders and talking about combinations. A friend suggested I call Larry’s Engine and Marine in Tuscon, Arizona and it turns out that was the best decision I could have possibly made.” The settled-on combo was an Indy MAXX block-based 528ci wedge with the same 440-1 heads that Ron had owned forever, a ProCharger F-2 blower, and a C&S blow-through carb. “On the dyno at Larry’s shop with a set of small 2-inch primary headers the engine made more than 1,400 hp.”

It was around this very time that Ron’s wife became ill with cancer and caring for her took priority over messing with the car. “The engine stayed in the crate, basically,” Ron said. “I would go out there and roll it over to make sure things were still good, but my attention was on my wife.” In 2012 her health took a drastic turn for the worse and she told Ron that she wanted him to finish the car with the upgrades that he was hoping to do. Unfortunately she passed before the car was finished, but her blessing meant the world to Ron and he went after the car with gusto.

“When I originally brought the car to Don Williams at Virginia Rod Company I just wanted the cage to be updated and brought to 7.50 cert,” Ron said. “Before long, Don and I were talking about things like carbon fiber tubs and door panels, a tubular K-member up front, the Top Gun Pro Mod four-link, a parachute mount, a Fab 9 rear end housing, and more,” Ron said while laughing. “I finally said to Don that he needed to do it the way he wanted and I am glad I did that. The car works amazingly well because of the work he put into it.”

It was Williams who suggested intercooling the car in order to make it more street friendly. When on the road, Ron runs 93-octane pump gas and a more conservative timing curve than he does when running C16 on the drag strip. The intercooler’s ability to keep a handle on inlet temperature really helps to keep the engine happy on the highways, and with a 3.54 rear gear, this car does see plenty of cruising.

With the engine fitted into the freshened car, the chassis all sorted out, a set of custom made stepped headers, and an awesome oval pipe exhaust directing all of the noise and gasses out of the back of the car, the plan was to have the car quickly shot with some matte black paint and then tested before pulling the whole thing back down and a Viper Blue paint job applied. “We brought it to the painter and he thought that the car would look mean with the flat black body and some glossy black elements like the tail stripe, the engine bay, and all the plumbing,” Ron said.

The car debuted in July of 2014 and it didn’t take long for the black paint to become a permanent part of the Dart’s character. “We were at a car show and a kid walked up with his dad,” Ron said. “The kid had a Star Wars shirt on and he asked his father what kind of car mine was. The dad knew it was a Dart and the kid just said, ‘Dart Vader.’ The name stuck and there was no possibly way to change the paint after that.”

So what about the drag strip? Oh there’s plenty to talk about there. This car was not put together to simply look the part, it was built to run, and run it does. Being that Ron grudge races the car, he can be tight-lipped about some performance elements of the machine. We understand that because the whole point of grudge racing is to keep your cards close to the vest. He did spill a couple of beans though, “While I am not going to tell you what the car runs flat out, I can tell you that it has gone 8.02/174 after kicking the blower belt off during an early run,” Ron said while laughing. “The car is an animal. The way it pulls down the track is crazy. You look at the g-meter on the RacePak and at the end of a run when the car is in high gear it is pulling at least as hard as it was coming off the starting line. You can try and describe this stuff to people but until you experience it you’ll never understand what it feels like.”

Ron enjoys the grudge scene because there’s an element of showmanship to it as well as some mystery involved. There’s also that certain satisfaction that comes from eating a guy’s lunch and them making him pay you for it. “I had a guy in an S10 with a nitrous small-block that had the words ‘Grudge King’ on the back window ask me for a race pretty soon after the car had come out,” Ron said. “He told me that he did not believe I actually drove the car on the street and that it didn’t make the power people said it did. I took the race and told him I would cover the money that he wanted. Long story short, I never saw the guy and beat him by a few car lengths. When the guy was paying me he told me that he still did not believe it was street driven and I told him to buy me the gas to get home and he could watch!”

Eventually this car will see time at the strip with the clocks on but Ron’s going to continue to enjoy the grudge scene for now. In fact, he’s got races lined up through the spring and summer to go work the Dart out at. No-time, grudge-style racing is an insanely popular trend at the strip these days and when you see cars like this Dart running in those races you can understand why.

Just like the big guy in the corner of the club who waits for the trouble to come to him, so does Ron and his Dart. Also like the big guy in the corner, when that trouble shows up, he knows how to handle his business. This ProCharged, 1,400hp Dart is one bad Jose and if you are showing up to challenge him, make sure you wallet is full because you’ll need it.

If you’re feeling salty at a drag strip in the Mid-Atlantic or Southeast and decide to challenge Ron Bookman and his 1969 Dart to a grudge race, you better have two things. First, the money you’ll be paying him, and second, your pride in a bucket because that’s where it’ll land.The plan was to test the car a little and then pull it apart for a rotisserie paint job but the flat black that was applied as a stop gap remains.If there’s a more menacing sight than the back of this car cruising down the road we don’t know what it is. Ron cranks off an amazing amount of street miles in this thing and with some timing pulled out of the engine, it’s more than happy on 93-octane pump gas. Mean!While it isn’t exactly luxury digs, it is a very well appointed interior in the Dart. Ron wanted the inside of the car to protect him with the addition of the 7.50 NHRA-legal cage, but he also wanted the fit and finish of carpet, a hand-stitched head liner, and the custom trimmed Kirkey seats.That’s what 1,410 hp of F-2 ProCharger-equipped, 528ci Indy MAXX block-based Chrysler wedge looks like. This engine has been in the car for several years and Ron reports that it still leaks down at about 1-1.5 percent when he checks it. That’s after lots of street miles and drag strip passes.Want to get your stuff down a drag strip? Here’s a simple recipe for fun: Take big Mickey Thompson Radials, add a Top Gun Pro Mod four-link suspension, Stanhuff coilovers, and a Fab 9 rear end housing, then throw 1,400 hp at it!The neat contrast on this car is the fact that the exterior is flat black but the piping and underhood area is glossy. Who are we kidding, no one is looking at the paint. They are listenting to the blower wail and that big 528 thump through the oval tube exhaust! Who says blow-through carbs don’t have good manners?!

Special thanks: Ron wants to thank Don Williams of Virginia Rod Company, Larry Peto of
Larry’s engine and Marine, Tim Lucento of Tim’s Customs, and Gary Harris
along with everyone else who contributed to this car’s build.

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